Edge of Tomorrow
by Mdnght2002
Summary: a mission gone wrong, Bond has to rely on Q to get him through it alive


Title: Edge of Tomorrow  
Author: mdnght2002  
Beta: N/A

Series: James Bond  
Character(s): James Bond, M, Q  
Genre: action  
Rating: PG-13 to R (in later chapters)  
Word Count: 1688  
Summary: a mission gone wrong, Bond has to rely on Q to get him through it alive

Notes: writing this for the July Camp Nanowrimo

Chapter One

The death of M still weighed heavily on James Bond's mind. Nightmares of her death still kept him awake at night despite the alcohol he consumed before tucking himself into his large bed in the wee hours of the night. Any mission that Mallory (the new M) gave him didn't help keep away the nightmares. Bond knew that sooner or later he was going to break and it wasn't going to be pleasant. He had experienced one the night before and hadn't gone back to sleep for fear of having a second one.

Instead of wallowing in grief in his flat, he had taken upon himself to go to work earlier than normal that day. He figured it would be easier to work off his nightmare than stew on it any further. He left his apartment on foot and traveled the short distance to the local gym that he had decided would work better than going to HQ. He figured there would be less people at the gym before five in the morning and he could work off his nightmares without anyone bothering him too much. After working out for an hour, he slowly made his way back home and took a powernap before he had to go to work.

The six am alarm woke up Bond from a deep sleep that he had finally managed to get after the nightmare and post-nightmare workout. Groggily, he got himself dressed for the day and meandered into his kitchen. After he made himself his breakfast (seasoned scrambled eggs, toast with marmalade, bacon thickly cut and extra crispy washed down with two cups of black coffee with exactly two lumps of sugar), he made his way down into the underground parking of his flat, got into his vintage Aston Martin DB5 and made his way towards MI6 HQ.

Several months ago, MI6 came out from the underground bunker and made a new home in an abandoned warehouse several miles outside of London. It was deemed too unsafe for MI6 to go back to their old headquarters after Silva's hacking into their system. The underground bunker was abandoned after Silva hacked into that one (no thanks to Q not thinking clearly when he plugged Silva's computer directly into the mainframe).

The abandoned warehouse was found on accident when a field agent made a wrong turn and ended up outside of London instead of heading towards the underground bunker. At least that was the story that Mallory had made up when he told MI6 that they were moving into the renovated warehouse. No one dared to question him about the decision to move. Bond still had some trouble calling Mallory M despite the fact that he had been the rightful candidate to take over the position after the events following the mishap that the old M tried to fix

After parking his car in the designated spot that had a new alias, he made his way into the building and went through the usual security protocols before he was allowed into the main area of the new MI6. On the outside the building looked like a typical factory that would churn out various goods but on the inside it was a different story. Various stations were scattered around the main area of the MI6 HQ with several other rooms adjoining the main room. The back area was M/Mallory's office. A stairwell near the entrance into the main room lead downstairs where Q branch and S branch were located and a floor below that was where Q tested out his new gadgets with his underlings that helped with his research for new gadgets.

Bond walked through the main area, ignoring the other field agents as they worked on various things (reports and the like) before he stopped in front of M's office door and gazed over at the desk that was directly outside of the office. Moneypenny looked up at Bond with a flirtatious look on her face. "I wouldn't go in there right away," she told him with a small grin on her face. "He isn't really in the mood to being bother by any of your 00's. I'm not really sure why. He came in with an attitude, barked at me not to have any of you double-ohs bothering him and then shut himself up in his office. Why don't you go see what Q is doing down in his lair? I am sure he would appreciate the company."

"I'm sure he will be very happy to see me," Bond said in a slightly sarcastic tone of voice. Not wanting to get on M's bad side so early on in the morning, he headed towards the stairwell and made his way down into Q branch. He nearly bumped into one of Q's underlings as the young man hurriedly scampered down the stairs behind him and into Q's main office that was off to one side of Q branch.

He quickly followed the underling to Q's office but stopped right outside the door as the underling knocked once before entering the room. He waited for the underling to exit before he gently opened the door and eased himself into the room. It wasn't very big for someone as important as Q but he figured that M had downsized Q from his old office that he had in the underground bunker following the fiasco with Silva.

Q looked like he was too busy with his laptop to notice that Bond had snuck into his office after his underling had left nor did it seem like he had noticed that said underling had brought him his cup of Earl Grey tea. He waited a few moments to give Q some time to snap back to the real world but after about five minutes of waiting Bond's patience began to wane. He looked back through the small window that Q's office door had to see if the underlings had noticed their boss' absence but it seemed like this was a typical thing for Q to do since the underlings were all busy with whatever it was that they had to do on a day-to-day basis.

Bond turned his attention back to Q and noticed that the other man had finally found his cup of tea and had begun to drink from his scrabble cup. He cleared his throat softly to get Q's attention but Q continued to type after he set his half-full cup of tea back down on his desk. His patience wearing thin, he took a few steps closer to Q's desk and cleared his throat again. This time Q did hear that and did a double take at Bond before diverting his attention back to his laptop.

"May I help you, double-oh seven?" Q asked in a slightly irate tone of voice. "It is too early for you to be in the office. Why don't you go home, get some sleep and come back at a decent hour."

Bond look at his wristwatch for a few moments before turning his gaze back at Q. "It is almost seven in the morning, Q. I don't think I can come in any later than that before M threatens to fire me over being late for work."

Q gave Bond a quick glance that turned into a glare. "Don't be ridiculous, double-oh seven. There is no way it is almost seven," he said before glancing down a at his laptop's clock. He frowned at his laptop before pulling out his mobile and frowned a little bit more. "I hate it when you are right, double-oh seven," he said in a slightly bitter tone of voice.

"So, Q, what do you have for me to test out today?" Bond said as he made his way over to a wooden chair that was in front of Q's desk.

"Nothing right now," Q said as he set down his mug that he had forgotten was still in his hand. Bond looked at Q curiously before grabbing the mug and pulling it away from the younger man. "I'm not finished with that."

"I know you aren't, Q. How long have you been in your office today?" Bond was dreading the answer to his question. He figured that Q hadn't gone home at all last night and had spent all night up on his computer.

"Do you really need to know the answer to that, double-oh seven?" Q's voice was beginning to sound a bit weary and angry at the same time.

"Do you want me to go to M and tell him that you've been here all night doing God knows what and not getting any sleep? I think the real question I should be asking you is have you been getting any sleep at all? I mean it, Q. You look like hell." Bond looked into the scrabble mug and noticed that three-quarters of the tea that his underling had brought him was gone. "You really need to lay off the tea for a bit, Q. I know it is good for you but right now drinking more than three mugs of this stuff could hurt your sleep cycle."

Q glanced up at Bond for a few brief moments before his attention was diverted back to his laptop by the sound of a ping. Bond figured that Q must have gotten an email from one of his underlings and that required the younger man's full attention. He started to turn around when Q's voice made him stop. "Are you getting enough sleep, double-oh seven? You look much worse than I do right now."

Bond frowned at Q's comment but remained silent as he exited Q's office. The last thing that he saw before he shut the office door was a small smirk on Q's lips. Determined not to let the younger man know just how much that comment made him feel irate at him, Bond gently shut the office door and made his way upstairs so that he could meet with M and get his next assignment. Hopefully that would get him away from Q for a little bit.


End file.
